Ch. 15: Sunshine

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Today marked my last ‘first’ day. I began today with Humanities, Ally’s Humanities class, which I hadn’t been in before. This morning after exiting the bus, successfully avoiding any eye contact situations, I sat in the cafeteria with Angela, Melanie and June again until Ally came by. We had decided to walk and talk a bit and came across the school librarian, Mr. Waller, who taught my film class too. He was surprised to see students on campus so early, at 7:35am and was surprised when we told him I got there at 7:20. Empathizing with us a bit, he invited us into the library to wait until school started. The library had been delightfully warm compared to the dense cold fog surrounding the school. A few minutes before the first bell Simon joined us, having texted Ally prior asking where we were. We all chatted a bit and then walked together to Ms. Del Rios’ class.
Class went by fairly well. This group of people felt like such a break compared to my other Humanities block. I tried to not focus on the whole Vance thing, and did so pretty successfully for the most part. Class ended uneventfully and I was relieved I had been able to focus. It was now the start of Break and my phone buzzed as I walked out of Ms. Del Rios’ classroom, following Simon and Ally.
<< From Sean to Rachel: meet me by the student parking lot? >>
I text him back then increase my pace and tell Ally and Simon I’ll see them later. Ally gives me a knowing look but then refocuses on Simon as he explains something to her. If she could only see the way she prioritizes him… Well, they’ll get there. I hope so.
I make my way through the courtyard, sending a quick wave to Marsha as I walk around benches and picnic tables lined with people. Passing the library, I continue down the hall, passing Mr. Hall’s classroom, past more lockers and other classrooms I am unfamiliar with. At last I see who I’m looking for up ahead, he’s standing just at the junction of the hall and the door leading to the student parking lot. There are a few others out here but no one I recognize. I continue walking up to him and he takes a few steps towards me, a big confident grin on his face.
“Hey there, Sunshine,” Sean says.
The nervous smile I wore became more confident at his use of ‘Sunshine.’
I reached him with an eyebrow raised, “Sunshine?”
“Yeah, my Sunshine,” he responds then continues like he didn’t just say that, “I want to show you something. Up for a little walk?”
My heart skipped a beat. I felt warm all over and I’m sure there was a blush finding its way up my neck. Mouth dry, I opted for a nod.
“Sure”
My Sunshine, repeated in my head.
He reaches for my hand and starts leading us to the parking lot, but rather than veering left towards the stairs Ally and I sat at yesterday, he goes to the right, behind the school. The fog is still fairly dense up here, with the sun only seen far down below, by the pier. The electricity coming from our hands has me downright giddy. I had thought about this moment but assumed I would feel shy or embarrassed or something by it, it really had the opposite effect. I felt - jazzed? Confident? He stops walking and turns to me.
His right hand rubs the back of his head, “I’m sorry, is this okay? I should’ve asked,” he indicates towards our hands.
I nod, “Yes it’s okay.”
A light reaches his eyes, “Okay. Great!”
We continue our walk by the parking lot and end up at an outbuilding behind the school. Between the school and the rest of the hill there are a few outbuildings, sheds or something. There is also a fenced off area with tarps covering things on the ground. Sean lets go of my hand to open the fence.
“What is this place?” I ask him.
“It’s a project that a few friends and I have been trying to make happen since we were Freshmen. We finally got a teacher to be our advisor who actually cared about this as much as we did. I wanted you to see it before it’s unveiled at some student rally next week,” Sean responded, reaching for my hand again, leading me in.
He lets go again and starts picking up a tarp.
“I hope you don’t think this is totally lame…” he says, looking down and maybe embarrassed, a look that just didn’t suit Sean’s personality.
Then the tarp is up and I see it’s a garden bed. There are 4 other tarps that I assume are also garden beds.
“A garden?” I ask.
“Yes! A community garden. I mean it’s not as big as we would like, but it’s a start. We really want to incorporate growing our own food, I mean have you seen some of the things that come out of the caf? Just awful. But imagine fresh foods we grow ourselves being available? I mean, obviously we can’t be totally self-sufficient, that would require a huge amount of space. But if we could scale up at some point to supplementing lunch a few days a week. It would go a long way in terms of waste reduction and everything,” he elaborated while pointing to different garden beds. “So what do you think?”
“I think it’s great!” I was so touched that he wanted me to see this.
This charismatic guy was also into gardening? Bettering our school? Food quality? Waste reduction? Wow.
He seemed pleased with my response, then his usual persona returned and he asked, “So, have you ever dated an eco-nerd before? A good looking one anyway?”
I couldn’t help but laugh. He was smoldering, I mean like the ‘smolder’ of Flynn Rider from Disney’s Tangled.
The word dated continued to echo in my thoughts.
“I’m going to take that as ‘No Sean, you are by far the most handsome eco warrior I know’ and we’ll leave it at that,” he said, in a knowing, teasing tone.
“Are you really going to make me answer that?” I asked back.
He put a hand to his heart, and in mock pain he responded, “Ouch, Rach. Don’t hurt the poor guy.”
I waved him off and started walking back towards the gate, shaking my head and smiling.
“Alright, alright. Hold on,” he said loudly, covering the garden beds back up. “Let me show you one more thing?” he asked me, walking towards one of the sheds.
“Why not?” I smiled, “I mean I guess we’re already here,” I teased back in a mock annoyance.
He produced a set of keys from his pocket and unlocked the shed. Pushing the door open he pulled a basket from inside and held it in front of me. The sun started piercing through the dense fog, making me shiver from the sudden heat I had been missing. I looked in the basket to see a bunch of seed packets.
“So we’ve already started sprouting some vegetables for this season. But I’d love your input on fruits for the next? What’s your favorite fruit?” he asks and then quickly adds, “And please don’t name something that grows on a tree - we’re just not there yet.”
I laugh at his shift in tone then say, “It’s alright. It’s strawberries.”
“Strawberries. Ah, cool. Well, we have to wait for it to get much warmer, or until we build that greenhouse… But that’s cool. We’ll still plant them together?” he asked. Sure and vulnerable.
“Uh, sure,” I smiled, noting the hopeful tone he had used in talking about months from now.
The bell rang.
“Well, looks like we’ve got to wrap this up. Why don’t you go ahead? I can close up, my class is super close,” Sean says, signaling me to move back towards the way we came.
“Sure, okay. Thanks for showing me your project by the way,” I don’t think I thanked him yet and want to make sure he knows I appreciate our side trip. “I’ll see you later?”
Sean nodded and turned back to the shed as I walked back towards the parking lot. I picked up my pace and continued on past Mr. Hall’s, past the library and courtyard, the offices, and finally made it to Levi’s class. The class had already been let in and I could hear commotion coming from beyond the door. I walked through the door and saw people taking their chairs down from the lab bench tables. I turned left towards my table and felt it again. The gaze boring into my skull. I wasn’t going to look, I swear.
But just then Levi came up behind me and asked, “Rachel, just checking in - were you able to get the items on that list I gave you?”
Which of course made me turn and of course Vance’s eyes were just to the side of Levi’s head. Of course. I sucked in a breath.
“Oh jeez, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you!” Levi exclaimed in his loud booming voice. This must be just a regular speaking volume for him?
My eyes refocused on Levi and broke apart from the set of black holes trying to devour my soul from across the room. I shivered.
“Oh, no. No worries,” I told Levi. “I, uh, yeah. I’ve got everything I need. I numbered the pages in my notebook already too.”
Levi smiled and gave me a big rough pat on the shoulder, “Great!” Then he walked towards the front of the room, writing the rest of the day’s Agenda on the board.
I still felt Vance’s presence but refused to look back. My current method of dealing is avoiding, he must be looking at me for something and I am refusing to give it. Not today. I am in too good of a mood from being with Sean earlier, I’m not going to let him ruin this.
I sit at my seat next to Sarah, placing my backpack on the floor next to me, and get my folder, science notebook, and pencil out. Bella at the table next to me waves hello and I wave back. I look forward towards Levi as he gathers the class’ attention, and notice the redhead grunge guy from the first day smiling at me. Totally keep forgetting about that guy. He looks away, back to the board and Levi.
Class goes by slowly. I spend my time trying to focus on our research project. You’d think Vance would let up, and maybe he does? But it still feels just as suffocating. I made a promise to myself to stick to this plan at least for today and hope that I won’t need to confront this guy. Irritation flares. Well, maybe I will confront him. Tomorrow. If he doesn’t stop this today. I just really don’t want to make a scene. I wonder if other people are noticing my discomfort or his staring. I glance at the other tables, but everyone is either focused on the chromebook in front of them or talking to each other. I try to refocus and open a new link. My screen gets dark for a moment and I see him! Vance is staring at my back and I see his creepy death-eater eyes in the screen’s reflection. The sudden image has me jump in my seat.
Sarah notices my movement, “Hey you alright?”
I’m not sure how much to actually tell her, so I decide to say nothing real at all, “Oh yeah, fine. Random cold shiver. Must be a draft.”
She looks unconvinced for a second but soon gets pulled into conversation with Lucy and Elizabeth about some guy Marco who has been apparently bothering Lucy for a date. She keeps saying she doesn’t like him, but this is the third time she herself has started a conversation about him. She either likes him and is in denial, or just really likes talking about herself. I’m leaning towards the latter.
Tuning into their conversation helps me get through the rest of class. A few times during these last few minutes I feel Vance’s gaze lessening and it makes me hopeful that my ignorance plan may just work. Levi announces class is ending soon and asks that we start shutting down chromebooks and put things away. The whole class starts moving chairs around, and people mill about putting things back where they belong. The redhead grunge kid walks around with a janitor’s broom quickly sweeping the area up. I see Levi thank him. I don’t see any class ‘jobs’ posted and wonder what that was about.
“Hey,” I ask Sarah, “What was that about?” I motion to the redhead, still not knowing his name.
“Oh, Kyle just does things like that. Kinda nice actually,” Sarah informs me before returning to packing up her backpack.
Redhead grunge guy now has a name, Kyle. What an enigma of a person. Nothing about him matched up. His face was like a nerdy stepbrother, his clothing looked like he had gotten dressed in a Hot Topic, his name sounded like he was president of some college fraternity, and his actions were that of some goody-two-shoes student from the 1950s. Alright.
The bell rang as everyone gathered by the door. Vance was somewhere behind me. I tried to stay by Sarah and Bella as it opened and we filed outside. The sun looked like it had made its way through. Though the classroom had still been warmer than the outside, I wasn’t hit with a shock of cold. I started walking towards the courtyard when I heard a voice.